1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of networking. More specifically, the present invention addresses the issue of managing service level goals or commitments for a group of network traffic serviced by a networking device (such as a “router”).
2. Background Information
With advances in integrated circuit, microprocessor, networking and communication technologies, increasing numbers of devices, in particulars digital computing devices, are being networked together. Devices are often first coupled to a local area network, such as an Ethernet based office/home network. In turn the local area networks are interconnected together through wide area networks, such as ATM networks, Frame Relays, and the like. Of particular relevance is the TCP/IP based global inter-networks, Internet.
As a result of this trend of increased connectivity, increasing numbers of applications that are network dependent are being deployed. Examples of these network dependent applications include but are not limited to, email, net based telephony, world wide web and various types of e-commerce. For these applications, success inherently means high volume of network traffic for their implementing servers. To ensure continuing success, quality of service through orderly and efficient handling of the large volume of network traffic has become of paramount importance. Various subject matters, such as scalability, distributive deployment and caching of contents, as well as achieving and maintaining service level goals or commitments by networking devices have become of great interest.
The capabilities and capacity of a networking device are probably the primary factors in determining the networking device's ability to meet its service level goals/commitments, whether the goals/commitments are reliability or performance oriented. However, in a shared networked world, having plenty of capabilities and capacity in and of themselves does not automatically guarantee that the networking device will be able to meet its service level goals/commitments. Unexpected or unplanned surges/increases in “non-essential” or “superfluous” network traffic potentially could cause congestion, and adversely impacts the networking device's ability to service the “essential” network traffic.
Various bandwidth reservations or priorities based schemes (attributed to individual packets or packet types and self-administered by the networking devices having the service level goal/commitments) are employed in the art to ensure that the appropriate service levels are provided. However, these schemes impose the burden on the networking device that is “struggling” to meet the service level goals/commitments, further compounding the problem. Moreover, the various schemes tend to be complex and difficult to implement. Thus, alternate approaches to enhancing the likelihood of a networking device's ability to meet its service level goals/commitments are desired.